I'm Francesca Albertini, I'm a Biomedical scientist
and I work at Saint Peter's Hospital in Chertsey in Surrey.
When I was at school I was always used to be interested in science,
mainly biology based and so when I went on to do my a-levels in biology
I did chemistry as well so and math so it was all a basis of science behind it.
And when I had thought about medicine, veterinary science something medical in
mind but I was very interested in the process of disease.
So more pathology based so then I read around and found out that biomedical scientist’s position
would actually be perfect because it was on a cellular level.
I then went to University of my levels and studied a B.Sc Biomedical science
which is a three year course I came out with a degree but when I applied
to the IBMS to have my degree accredited they told me that it wasn't
which then in turn I had to go back to Uni for another two years
to study Biomedical science again but this time it was a coterminous degree
so I carried out two work placements over the two summers which were an eight-week blocks
and I rotated for the first placement I rotated around all the disciplines in pathology to
get a feel for each discipline, see how I liked it, see how it works,
see how everyone works together and the role they played within the hospital and then on the second placement I decided for the eight weeks
where I work the whole placement so I decide cellular pathology
which was histology and cytology and I worked four weeks
in both departments and upon that I decided.
So ---- definitely what I wanted to have, a position in.
It was definitely the diagnostic site where some of the other disciplines it was
you just prepared all the samples and then they were carried off
and other people clinicians to look at them instead whereas with cytology you prepare it
yourself and then look at it down the microscope
and give your own opinion and then you can check other,
you can give your opinion on other people's and so that's why it appealed to me definitely the fact
that I knew I was having some input into the final result which could then
affects the patient's care and management.
I'm, my primary responsibilities to screen cervical samples
so to look for precancerous lesions we can also pick up infections
and it's part of the National screening program for over twenty five year olds
so that's my main workload.
I also at the moment.. because I'm still learning,
I'm learning non gynae, non gynae samples which is pleural effusions,
urine, sputums and again we're looking for malignancies
and precancerous lesions in them as well.
I also do andrology so I do semen analysis and prostatectomy samples
and in infertility samples we look at sperm counts, morphologies,
pH volume all different aspects like that and they generally referred to us after,
if a patient hasn't been able to conceive for every year and also we do prostatectomy samples
that would check that the vasectomy has actually worked.
So I do that, those are my three main roles and I also prepare the samples
as well so I get them prepared more into slides and then I could do the microscopy afterwards.
So I do it from the start the sampled at the very end of the reporting.
I think it was a pressure certainly in clinics because also we I go up to clinics
FNA clinics which are Fine Needle Aspiration and the clinician will insert a needle
into a lung from the patient so say if they've got an enlarged thyroid,
the clinician will insert a needle into their thyroid, extracts some cells
and then we will be in the clinic with them and we'll put the sample onto the slide,
stain it up there and look at it and let the clinician know if they've got the right good cellularity
for a diagnosis whether they need to go back in and take more cells etc.,
and that's quite a high pressured situation
because in some of the clinics especially bronchoscopy,
the patient has a tube down into their lung, and the patient is also sedated
so the condition needs to work at a certain speed
because you can't keep the patient under for too long
so it's mainly the pressured environment I find.
The highlight for me is you know there's a patient that's going to, you're helping a patient,
it's rewarding in that way you know that from what you are saying
or you're reporting you're giving your opinion on that that could directly affect
the way the patient will be cared for and treated.
So for me that's thus rewarding that's my highlight
and low light probably be some of the work is routine so it can be a bit monotonous
but again at the time you know the patient that the end result is going to hopefully
have a good outcome and one of the other low lights is again
in some of the clinics the patients can be quite unwell so it's quite upsetting
to see so sick people but again you know that your work is for their good
and hopefully you have a good outcome and help towards their management and treatment.
And one in particular that I've been doing is still a trial but it’a called --- which is one step nucleic
acid amplification which is a molecular technique and it tests sentinel nodes from breast cancer
patients and is intraoperative so while the patient's having a lumpectomy or mastectomy
the surgeon will remove the sentinel node which is the lymph node in the patient's armpit
and send it to us and we process it on a machine to see
whether the tumor has spread to the lymph nodes
in which case we then will ring surgery back up and tell them that it’s spread
and so they'll clear all the lymph nodes in the patient and if not then they know
it hasn't so they don't have to do the axillary clearance
and then that way as well it saves the patient from having to come back for a second surgery
because normally the sampe would be sent off
and it would take a couple of days to process
whereas this is an intraoperative so within half an hour fourty five minutes
they'll know whether they have to remove the axillary lymph nodes or not.
So that's one of the new things that I've come across.